ld have come to
resolve his difficulties, obviating the need for recourse to those more
dangerous measures with which he had charged Sir Richard Verney. He
perceived how suspicion might now fall upon himself, how his enemies
would direct it, and on the instant made provision. There and then he
seized a pen, and wrote to his kinsman, Sir Thomas Blount, who even then
was on his way to Cumnor. He stated in the letter what he had learnt
from Bowes, bade Blount engage the coroner to make the strictest
investigation, and send for Amy's natural brother, Appleyard. "Have no
respect to any living person," was the final injunction of that letter
which he sent Blount by the hand of Bowes.

And, then, before he could carry to the Queen the news of this accident
which had broken his matrimonial shackles, Sir Richard Verney arrived
with the true account. He had expected praise and thanks from his
master. Instead, he met first dismay, and then anger and fierce
reproaches.

"My lord, this is unjust," the faithful retainer protested. "Knowing the
urgency, I took the only way--contrived the accident."

"Pray God," said Dudley, "that the jury find it to have been an
accident; for if the truth should come to be discovered, I leave you to
the consequences. I warned you of that before you engaged in this. Look
for no help from me."

"I look for none," said Sir Richard, stung to hot contempt by the
meanness and cowardice so characteristic of the miserable egotist he
served. "Nor will there be the need, for I have left no footprints.

"I hope that may be so, for I tell you, man, that I have ordered a
strict inquiry, bidding them have no respect to any living person, and
to that I shall adhere."

"And if, in spite of that, I am not hanged?" quoth Sir Richard, a sneer
upon his white face.

"Come to me again when the affair is closed, and we will talk of it."

Sir Richard went out, rage and disgust in his heart, leaving my lord
with rage and fear in his.

Grown calmer now, my lord dressed himself with care and sought the
Queen to tell her of the accident that had removed the obstacle to their
marriage. And that same night her Majesty coldly informed de Quadra that
Lady Robert Dudley had fallen down a flight of stairs and broken her
neck.

The Spaniard received the information with a countenance that was
inscrutable.

"Your Majesty's gift of prophecy is not so widely known as it deserves
to be," was his cryptic comment.

She stare